Tips factory: draft tips (work in progress)


Back to the home page

Caution: the draft tips on this provisional page are raw material. They're as yet untested, unedited and lack explanation.

.... nevertheless, they're promising and generally well worth a try. Make a Timeshift snapshot before you apply them, though. Good luck!

Note: the draft tips for Realtek WiFi chipsets have been moved to this page.

Contents of this page:

Pioneer car radio: error 19 while reading USB stick

1. On a Pioneer car radio (confirmed on the MVH-S12x), you can get to see the following error when you insert a USB memory stick: FORMAT READ ERROR 19.

You should be able to fix that like this:

Menu - System - Android Wired - Memory - press Enter - press Source - press Source.

Stop the blinking wireless LED in Linux (draft, untested!)

2. The LED that indicates that your WiFi is enabled or not, is blinking every time the WiFi card transmits or receives data. This can be highly annoying.

Luckily you might be able to stop the blinking for an Intel WiFi chipset (unfortunately not for chipsets from other makers).

For not too ancient Intel chipsets that are running on the iwlwifi driver, execute this command line:

echo "options iwlwifi led_mode=1" | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/wlan-blinkstop.conf

Reboot your computer.

For old Intel chipsets that run on the iwlegacy driver, do this:

echo "options iwlegacy led_mode=1" | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/wlan-blinkstop.conf

Reboot.

Lenovo laptops with hard blocked WiFi (draft, untested!)

3. Disable Secure Boot in the BIOS. For that, you might need to set an administrator password first, in the BIOS.

Note: probably only for the 4.15.x kernel series!

Launch a terminal and execute these lines, one by one (the last line is very big, but it's still just one line!):

sudo apt-get install git build-essential linux-headers-$(uname -r)

git clone https://github.com/jeremyb31/ideapad-laptop.git

sudo dkms add ./ideapad-laptop

sudo dkms install ideapad-laptop/1.0

echo "options ideapad_laptop override_has_hw_rfkill_switch=0" | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/ideapad_laptop.conf

Reboot and test.

Right display resolution for an old laptop with a VIA Chrome9 HC video chipset (draft, untested!)

4. Launch a terminal and do this:

sudo touch /etc/X11/xorg.conf

xed admin:///etc/X11/xorg.conf

Copy/paste the following blue text into it:

Section "Device"
       Identifier "Device0"
       Driver "vesa"
EndSection
Section "Monitor"
       Identifier "Configured Monitor"
      HorizSync 30.0-62.0
      VertRefresh 50.0-70.0
EndSection
Section "Screen"
       Identifier "Default Screen"
       Device "Card0"
       Monitor "Configured Monitor"
       DefaultDepth 24
       SubSection "Display"
               Modes "1280x800" "1024x768" "800x600"
       EndSubSection
EndSection

Save, close, reboot.

Solution when installing the Grub bootloader fails (draft, untested!)

5. It might happen that the installation of Ubuntu or Mint fails at the very last moment, namely at the installation of the Grub bootloader. This should be solvable as follows:

a. Boot from the Ubuntu or Mint Live DVD/USB.

b. Launch a terminal.

c. Start the installation process without installing the bootloader, by this terminal command:

sudo ubiquity -b

d. Press Continue testing after the installation is over.

e. Now the real job begins. Mount the newly installed file system on /mnt, with these four commands (use copy/paste to transfer them to the terminal, in order to avoid typos):

sudo mount -v /dev/sda2 /mnt
sudo mkdir -v /mnt/boot/efi
sudo mount -v /dev/sda1 /mnt/boot/efi
for i in /dev /dev/pts /proc /sys; do sudo mount -B $i /mnt$i; done

(where sda2 is the root partition and sda1 is the EFI system partition)

f. Load efivars by this command:

sudo modprobe -v efivars

g. Reinstall grub-install for a 64-bit version, with these two commands:

sudo apt-get install --reinstall grub-efi-amd64
sudo grub-install --no-nvram --root-directory=/mnt

h. Change root to /mnt and update grub, with the following two commands:

sudo chroot /mnt
sudo update-grub

i. Move and rename the installed bootloader, with these four commands:

cd /boot/efi/EFI
sudo cp -R ubuntu/* BOOT/
cd BOOT
sudo cp grubx64.efi bootx64.efi

j. Reboot the system. You're done!

Disabling the driver for an unused ethernet chipset on a laptop (draft, untested!)

6. Only use wireless on your laptop? Then disable the driver for the unused ethernet chipset like this:

a. Establish the name of the driver for your ethernet chipset. For example: r8169

b. If it's r8169, execute this terminal command:

echo "blacklist r8169" | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-ethernet.conf

c. Then this command:

sudo update-initramfs -u

d. Reboot and test.

Calibre for e-books: installing the latest version

7. In a terminal:

sudo -v && wget -nv -O- https://download.calibre-ebook.com/linux-installer.sh | sudo sh /dev/stdin

Disabling the driver for an Intel WiFi chipset (draft, untested!)

8. This should disable an Intel WiFi chipset running on the iwlwifi driver:

a. Initial blacklisting:

echo "blacklist iwlwifi" | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

Reboot.

b. Undoing it (by the system administrator, for doing updates and such):

sudo sed -i 's/blacklist iwlwifi/#blacklist iwlwifi/' /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

Reboot.

c. Re-blacklisting in the future (after the system administrator has finished updating):

sudo sed -i 's/#blacklist iwlwifi/blacklist iwlwifi/' /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

Reboot.

Applying a BIOS update on a Lenovo laptop without Windows on it (tested, but draft)

9. It's possible to update the BIOS on a Lenovo laptop without Windows on it, even though the BIOS can only be updated by means of a Windows installer.

The solution isn't too difficult, fortunately: simply download the iso of the legal and free Hiren's Boot CD PE, which is based on Windows 10 PE. Create a bootable medium with it and boot from that medium.

Then within the live session, launch Windows Explorer and create a folder called Lenovo (or whatever) on the root of the live session of Hiren's Boot CD PE.

Next, download the BIOS update file from the support section of the Lenovo website, execute it and let it unpack its contents in that specially created folder called Lenovo (don't let it attempt to actually apply the update: it'll probably fail, because the root "drive" of the live session is called X and not C).

Finally, using Windows Explorer, launch a terminal (DOS box, command line) in the folder called Lenovo (or whatever) that contains the unpacked BIOS update files, and execute the file called "install.bat" from within that terminal by typing install.bat and pressing Enter. That's all.

Installing the driver for an HP Laserjet 1018 printer (draft, untested)

10. You can try the following for installing the driver for an HP Laserjet 1018 printer. Tested by someone else in Linux Mint 21, not by me:

a. Launch the application Printers from the menu, and remove the existing instance of the Laserjet 1018.

Then close the application Printers.

b. Launch a terminal window.

c. Execute the following series of terminal commands (always use copy/paste to transfer them to the terminal, in order to avoid typos):

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get remove hplip cups-filters cups hplip-data system-config-printer-udev

sudo rm -v -rf /usr/share/hplip

sudo apt-get install printer-driver-foo2zjs printer-driver-foo2zjs-common

sudo apt-get install tix groff dc cups cups-filters

sudo getweb 1018

d. Disconnect the USB cable of the printer, count to five and reconnect it.

e. Launch the application Printers again from the menu and add your printer; you may have to click on the "refresh" button (the round arrow) first. Then print a test page.

f. Reboot your computer and turn the printer off and on. All should work well now permanently.


To the content of this website applies a Creative Commons license.

Back to the home page

Disclaimer